


Unto the Summer's End

by GodmotherToClarion



Series: Sped By Flame [7]
Category: Free!
Genre: Alternate Universe - Royalty, Alternate Universe - Splash Free, Epistolary, Fluff, Gen, Happy Ending, Letters, M/M, Marriage, Milad is Makoharu's son, Poor Rin, he suffers a lot guys
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-29
Updated: 2018-12-29
Packaged: 2019-09-29 16:35:45
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,297
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17207003
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GodmotherToClarion/pseuds/GodmotherToClarion
Summary: Four years after their marriage, the two crown princes of Qasr spend the summer on opposite sides of the desert.(Or: Haru and Makoto, one letter at a time).





	Unto the Summer's End

**Author's Note:**

  * For [hapgen](https://archiveofourown.org/users/hapgen/gifts).



> As usual, you don't need to read the rest of the series to read this! All you have to know is that Haru and Makoto are married, and spending a summer apart; Milad is their son. Rin is also married and has a son, Toraichi (nicknamed Tora). Haru traveled across the desert to be present for his niece's birth, while Makoto stayed in their home kingdom with Milad.

_ Lord Haruka Tachibana of Atar Qasr to Lord Makoto Tachibana, Crown Prince of Atar Qasr _

_ Sealed on the eleventh day of Subat in the year 504 in Sahrastan, Iwatobi  _

_ Care of Master Hamid Khaysh to the palace of Sardahan, Atar Qasr _

______

My love, 

I am writing you in a tearing hurry, for in the manner of the Nanase clan (or perhaps the Kirishimas, for Jun and Aki are as much like one another as two peas in a pod) the new princess of Sahrastan saw fit to make her appearance nearly two weeks early, and so the very night I arrived we were all woken before dawn to see her. There was no danger this time, for Jun or for little Jamila, and Aki can scarcely keep his wits about him for joy—for the moment she was born she struck him full in the face, and he is certain it foretells her health and might in womanhood. Now that the second heir to the crown is come his heart has been set at ease, and it is doubly sweet to them that the child is a girl; Hana would not hear of having a brother, and no little maiden has been gladder to welcome a baby than she is, I’m sure. But I have not the time to tell more, sweetheart, for as I pen this the caravan is set to depart in an hour, and since my old chamber has become a nursery again I cannot recall where Aki keeps his envelopes. I send all my love to you, my darling, and a kiss to Milad and the rest. Write to me soon,  _ shin’ainaru-ko _ , for I am already lonesome without you, and counting the days until I return to Sardahan again. 

Yours ever,

Haru. 

* * *

_ Lord Makoto Tachibana, Prince of Atar Qasr to Shahzada Haruka Tachibana _

_ Sealed on the tenth day of Subat in the year 504 in Sardahan, Atar Qasr _

_ Care of Lord Rei Ryuugazaki to the palace of Sahrastan, Iwatobi _

_ ______ _

Sweetheart, 

Doubtless by the time you read this note you shall know I have sent you a present accompanying it (and he did not go under his own power, for the moment you departed I set to work persuading him). I pray by the grace of the Goddess that my letter finds Jun and the baby in good health and spirits, and that Rei has reached you safely; Nagisa could not abide your brother’s remaining here in Sardahan, when you are the heir to the Qasrian throne and Rei is a healer with a hundred to take his place if need be. He sends his love to you,  _ amarya,  _ and so do Rin and the others. I suppose by Rei’s arrival the child shall be there to greet him, and all of us here in the East give our best to Jun and Aki; for the baby there is a parcel nearly as long as you are tall, for not a one of our household could restrain our joy, and I myself took the liberty of embroidering a frock. The little one need not wear it, for I am certain there is much better to be had in Sahrastan, but I could not find a single bauble fine enough for a gift—and in my loneliness I have taken up stitching to pass the time, for it eases my heart a little to put my hands to work. 

Though you have been gone but a fortnight I miss you dreadfully, Haru-chan. You are beside me from dawn to dusk, in every task I undertake from Milad’s bathing to fencing-practice with the regiment, and so the whole of the day is dull and forlorn without you—I cannot even go to the kitchens for breakfast without lamenting the absence of the pickles you favor, for now that you are abroad Aunt Azar permits nobody to touch them save Milad. Even Rin is crosser than he ought to be, though perhaps that is Gou’s doing; you remember how he fretted for her in the month before Aisha was born, and now that she and Sei are soon to have a second he can scarcely keep still for worry. It does not help that Toraichi took a fever three days past, but he has his father’s constitution—he is already running about again, and biting all the palace folk who dare to cross his path. Now that I think on the matter I fear Rei left the East to keep clear of him, but Rin himself could find no fault in that. Tora’s mischief is Sakura’s exactly, and if not for Milad’s scolding we would fare far worse than a set of teeth in the ankle now and then.

Our little lad has been keeping good pace with his lessons, and only yesterday he made his first greeting to the court. The whole of the room heard him plain as day, my darling, and I have never been so proud in all my life—six years old, and still he speaks with the dignity of a lad three times his age! We shall have no need of an elocution tutor at least, whatever the state of his figuring. I would write more of him, my love, but he wishes to tell you all his news himself, and so I shall say no more save that I have thought of you in every moment since your departure, whether I am awake or lost to the veil of my dreams...for you walk there as surely as I do,  _ jaanya, _ and in such loveliness that I weep to leave you behind. Though I know you must remain a month in the West I ache to see you again, to rest beside you by night with Milad sleeping between us—there shall be no peace for me until you are safely at home, but until then I send you a thousand kisses for every hour we are parted. 

Your loving husband, 

Makoto. 

* * *

(within the same envelope, the following: )

_ Prince Milad of Qasr to Mama, Shahzada  _

_ Sealed Subat tenth _

_ Care of Uncle Rei-chan to Iwatobi _

_ ______ _

Dear Mama,

Papa says the first thing I ought to write is to send my love to Baby, so I shall: I don’t suppose she can read yet, so I put on Aunt Sakura’s coral-salve and kissed the page instead. If Baby is a prince and not a princess, please tell him I am sorry Cousin Hana is cross, but that she will love him just as well. Aisha says he ought to be sorry for not being a princess, but it is only because Tora bit her twice during breakfast. I think Tora is the only one who really ought to be sorry, but he never is, and he bit me again when I told him so. Uncle Nagisa says Uncle Rin did the same when he was a little boy, and that he bit Uncle Sei most of all, but Uncle Rin says Uncle Nagisa is only a tale-teller. Which one of them is right, Mama? Papa says they are both telling tales, but I don’t see how that can be. 

But I greeted the court yesterday, and I wasn’t afraid a bit! I only bid them good-morning and dismissed the court for luncheon, but Papa says I did wonderfully, and that Aunty Azar heard me all the way from the kitchens. She’s going to give me a kitten for it, a pretty gold one called Idan with stripes on his ears, but I’ll keep him as a present for you. He’s a Mama sort of kitten anyway, I think, because he is so handsome. Papa always calls you the loveliest youth who ever walked the five kingdoms, and if you don’t keep Idan you’ll never find a cat half so nice. 

(Mama, Papa is laughing now. Why? Is it a married secret? You always say it’s a married secret, when you have one. Will I have married secrets when I grow up and marry Aisha? Do Aunt Gou and Uncle Sei have married secrets? I don’t think they do. Aunty Gou’s only secret is that Uncle Rin is afraid of spiders, she told me so herself.)

Here are ten more kisses. I wanted to send more, but Tora ate the rest of the coral-salve, so I can’t. Good night, Mama! Papa is calling me to come to bed now, so I must go to sleep. 

Love, 

Milad. 

* * *

_ Lord Haruka Tachibana of Atar Qasr to Lord Makoto Tachibana, Crown Prince of Atar Qasr _

_ Sealed on the twenty-sixth day of Subat in the year 504 in Sahrastan, Iwatobi  _

_ Care of Lady Phina of the house Shamsal to the palace of Sardahan, Atar Qasr _

_ ______ _

My most beloved darling, 

I fear you shall not be able to read this parchment at all when it comes to you, for I am weeping so that my tears have already begun to mingle with the ink. How dearly I love you, Makoto, that a word from your hand wrings my heart in two! For this last fortnight I have not slept, reaching endlessly for you and Milad amomg the covers beside me, and when Rei delivered your letter I clutched it to my breast and sobbed until the servants came with breakfast. The children are a comfort, cunning as they are, but still I cannot forget that the light of my days is gone from me, and that I must wait a month longer to hold you near again. It has driven me nearly mad to go without you, and when I sleep I feel your arms about me so keenly that upon waking I cry out to find myself alone. When I am not with Aki and the rest I think only of you, my sweetheart, and my lips trace your name of their own accord as if to beckon you close— _ Makoto, Makoto, Makoto,  _ for never in all my days under Heaven has a sound been half so fair!

Betimes I forget that I ever blushed to write you love-letters,  _ jaanya!  _ I pray we need never be parted again, for to see my heart in writing wounds me beyond measure, reminding me anew that a fifteen days’ journey lies betwixt the pair of us, and that if I commenced my journey tonight we would not be together till Huzayran. Then I recall that I am duty-bound to remain until Jamila’s first-moon birthday, and though I have sorely missed my kin I would flee to you in a moment if I were free to go. I beg of you,  _ amarya _ —I have not the strength to keep from returning to Qasr, and if you write to me so tenderly but once more I shall run barefoot into the desert and set my course to Sardahan. For the sake of your beloved, tell me only of your doings in my absence and Milad’s mischief with the little ones, for I can bear no more! If I read again of your loneliness and kiss the salve-prints of your mouth on the page I shall be guilty of the greatest offense to my brother and sister, and perish of thirst on the plains as like as not. Lend me this one mercy, darling, or send me out of my wits so sweetly that I should delight in losing them. The harvest-moon cannot come swiftly enough, and I fear the whole of Sahrastan knows it; I spent half the day shut up in my chambers, and when Rei lost his patience and came to fetch me he found me lying on the hearthrug with the most foolishly love-lorn light in my eyes he had ever the misfortune to see, or so he said. Rei is made to suffer more than he deserves, I think, but after such a life as he has led I believe he delights in the fretting. 

Keep safe, my love. Do not spend too long abed, or in the council chambers; sleep and dine and rest as you ought, and mind the lads in the practice-ring. I send you a kiss for every breath you draw to-day, dearheart, and a hundred more for every word and every breath of laughter. I pray to meet you again tonight in my dreams, and every evening hence until my return to Sardahan. Perhaps you shall dream of me as well, and so tell me all that passes at home in Qasr without the trouble of letters. 

Yours unto the world’s ending, my dearest—

_ Haru.  _

* * *

(left beside Rin’s pillow, the following: )

_ Lord Makoto Tachibana of Atar Qasr to Lord Rin Matsuoka, First Advisor _

_ Sealed on the fifteenth day of Subat in the year 504 in Sardahan, Atar Qasr  _

_ Care of Lady Sakura Matsuoka to her husband, who (by the grace of the Goddess) is still asleep as I write this _

_ ______ _

Dear Rin, 

When you wake to-day, you shall find my chambers empty. There is not much to do for the next moon or so, and I fear your Crown Prince shall waste away to nothing if he is made to go without his beloved another six weeks. For the sake of my king and country, I have taken Milad and joined the Alisian caravan that goes to the West at the seventh bell this morning. I shall not return before Haru’s duties in Sahrastan are finished, and then I shall bear any number of scoldings you like. 

Until then, my brother!

Makoto. 

* * *

_ Lord Rin Matsuoka of Atar Qasr to Crown Prince Makoto Tachibana _

_ Sealed on the twentieth day of Subat in the year 504 in Sardahan, Atar Qasr  _

_ Care of Lord Sanim Asakura to to the palace of Sahrastan, Iwatobi _

_ ______ _

Dear Makoto, 

I resign. 

Regretfully yours, 

Rin. 

 


End file.
